Instructions on how to brew destructive change
by Lyrei
Summary: Definition of Change: To lay aside, abandon, or leave for another. My change isn't of moving houses or leaving anything behind. I am the one left behind in the darkness. For CrapPishh's fanfic challenge. The unworthiness creeps up on me.


**A change: Instructions on how to brew destructive change.**

**All references to Maplestory belongs to Nexon or whoever owns it at the moment. I do not own Lego either.**

* * *

Everyone wants to change something about themselves. Whether it was a desire to be thin, to be pretty, to be strong, or the desire to have wisdom, it was usually to change themselves for the better. Change may be good for most people. But for other people, it could mean total destruction- an alteration to a person's life that could send them toppling off their path of life.

I was one of those people.

See, one little thing could mean the most. One little shove or a single word, a glare or a flare of temper. And the shove happened one night in the lands of El Nath, the word was a 'no', the glare was deadly and the temper ended all that I held dear. But now the shove was a meso cheque in my face, the word was 'Here' and there were no glares or flares of temper.

'Here's the 10 million mesos I owed you for the steelies you gave me. And the steely, if you need it.'

He shoved both the items at me, impatiently waiting for me to take them. I blinked at his almost invisible form melding with the shadows of the Ellinian night. He had always been beautiful in the night- his raven locks and dark eyes the exact shade of twilight. He shot me a frustrated look, as if to say 'what more do you want?'

_You, _I wanted to say. I wanted to throw the meso cheque and steelies right back at his face and encircle my arms around him as I had done a thousand times before. _Just you. _But I was too much of a coward to do anything but to nod my thanks and numbly throw the meso cheque into my backpack. I just sat there, staring at my feet.

'You can have the steely back.' I said softly, the deafening chirps of crickets almost covering my words with their noise. He heard it- his sharpened thief senses picked out every syllable I uttered. He shook his head, and drew a star from his Black Mamba claw. It sparkled in the weak moonlight and I almost gasped in surprise.

It was a hwabi star. _The _hwabi star. The _grande fromage _of all throwing stars. His face remained emotionless as he spun it back into his claw, closing the star compartment with a little 'click'.

'I don't need steelies now.'

I nodded dumbly as he hasted himself and flash jumped away with the promise that he'd return all that I had given to him by the next day at the same time.

_But how could he?_

The last time I had spoken with him he had less than a million mesos to his name, he was heavily in debt with the biggest money-lending guild in Kerning City, and the only stars he had was the steely I had given him and a couple of kumbis he had hunted from Fire Boars. How could he afford to throw 10 million mesos at me, return the steely and own hwabis? And he had gotten so high-levelled too, in such a short time.

* * *

Suspicious, I watched him. Heck, you could call me a stalker and I'd agree with you. I watched with an inordinate amount of jealousy as a beautiful flame-haired girl pointed out scrolls that he'd make huge profits out of in the Free Market. I watched as he opened up his store and sold stuff for an ungodly amount of mesos. Then I watched as he strolled off to the Vikings map. I lagged behind, my puny teleport no match for his flash jump and haste. But I got there all the same.

Eyes wide, I stared from my hidden little corner as he sucked monsters from the entire map and placed them in front of him with a flick of his wrist. The Vikings look slightly subdued and they remained in the same spot. Then I gaped as he killed them all, two stars for a pile of money and a Viking Sail Cloth.

And an _ilbi. _

I watched a little smile light up his face for the briefest of moments as he pocketed it, probably calculating how much he could earn. Then he _disappeared._

Where'd he go? I typed his name in my communicator, feverishly searching for his location. It said he was in this map, but I couldn't see him _anywhere. _

'Had enough of stalking me yet, darling?'

I froze immediately at his husky voice right beside my left ear, not daring to speak. He strolled in front of me and leant against the pile of humongous blocks of Lego.

'How… Why…?'

I winced. My brain was too frazzled to even form a coherent sentence, let alone a full-blown interrogation. He smirked at my lack of words and replied while throwing an ilbi star up and down. I watched it, hypnotized.

'This?' He raised his arm and a flock of hundreds or thousands of Vikings flew behind him. Another flick of the arm and they all died, dropping mesos and some equipment. I clenched my teeth at the little display of power.

'Why darling, it's all for you.' His gaze hardened. 'You rejected me because I was dirt poor and weak. I owed money left, right and center; guild members and friends alike were after my blood and their lent mesos.'

'But _forbidden techniques_?' I whispered, my brain finally registering the full solemnity of the situation. He shrugged nonchalantly.

'My helping star taught me. He saved my worthless life when I had nothing, not even a _girlfriend_ to help me.' He glared at me now, throwing his star right above my head. It slammed into plastic pillar behind me with incredible force and I winced as chunks of bright red plastic fell on my head.

'He taught me how to _hack_, how to acquire money… how to hunt down the pathetic squirts who were once my _friends_.' He sneered a little and jerked his head in my direction, indicating myself.

Then he smiled.

'I have to thank you, Anna. Your rejection changed me for the better. I'm no longer pathetic, or meso-less… I have powerful, powerful friends. And I'm rich.'

My heart grew cold at his words, as cold as his smile that he gave me as he drew two of his previous hwabi stars.

'I thank you Anna. But you are no longer of any use to me and everything I have owed you, I have repaid you in double. Except _one. Little. Thing.'_

He produced a shadow clone of himself, then another, and another.

'I've never given you what you so generously bestowed upon me. _Pain._ Let's see _your _world fall apart, let's see _your _heart break into a thousand pieces, let's see _your _friends discard you like a useless tool.'

Then he raised his claw and unleashed the force of eight poison-tipped hwabi stars at me. The last thought was of how ironic it was. It was midnight, the exact time he had said that he'd return anything I had given him.

* * *

'Hello Anna dear. How are you today?'

The nurse arrived in all her white-robed glory, briskly taking the clipboard at the foot of my bed off and checking my reaction to any form of torture they used on me. Of course, nothing changed. Not even a flinch or a jerk of my limbs to the exasperated use of knives slicing my hand. The familiar look of disappointment washed over her face briefly, then she looked at me and forced a fake smile.

'You're doing wonderfully, Anna. Maybe we can improve again next time.'

'_We?' _There was no 'we' in this. There was only me, and me alone. _She_ wasn't the one who was basically a vegetable. She wasn't the one with the kunai lodged forcibly in the spine. She wasn't the one who couldn't respond to or feel anything for the past eight years. She could say every single malicious word she felt like whereas the most I could do was to flutter my eyelashes. She could move her limbs oh-so-perfectly well, whereas I lay on the bed like a broken puppet with cut strings. _SHE _wasn't the one suffering.

I was.

I couldn't move a muscle since Sebastian threw what seemed like his entire inventory of stars at me that day at the Vikings.

He had changed the path of my life forcibly, throwing a gigantic rock right in front of me so I had nowhere else to go and nothing else to do but to fall off my cleric path into the abyss of nothingness.

All it took was one shove, one word, one glare and one flare of temper. Throw it into the cauldron and mix it three times anti-clockwise with angry words. Add one deranged hermit, a foolish cleric and eight hwabi stars with enough poison laced in the edges to destroy all the muscles in the body.

These are the ingredients you need to brew destructive change. An unwanted alteration to the already screwed-up life of an unlucky cleric named Anna.

My change wasn't a change of scenery, a haircut, new clothes, or becoming stronger. Not of someone entering my life bringing all the metaphorical shit of sunlight and stupid moonbeams.

But of someone stealing what little precious light I had left, and leaving me in eternal darkness.

* * *

I'm still learning. ;__;


End file.
